One in the same. Non-interventionism means not helping allies and not helping allies means you'll quickly become isolationist. If you do not help with a trade partner's affairs, the trade relationship deteriorates. Likewise, if you help a trade partner, in the future they will be more inclined to help you in a time of need. Both sides give a little to get a lot.

Friendly diplomatic communication is a good thing (as long as it remains friendly) but talking sometimes doesn't work. That's what the big stick is for.

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Name one conflict since WWII where it was advantageous for us to fight another nation, or when we went to aid of an embattled ally? Every conflict since then has been motivated by resources acquisition, or to fight an illusionary communist threat that fell apart under its own weight more than from our constant intervention. The Gulf War was used to establish a U.S. military presence in the Middle East against the wishes of the Saudi people, and create a more favorable oil-trade situation. You could say Afghanistan was justified, but now it has become a launching pad to put pressure on Pakistan while we kill innocent civilians in their border regions on hunches that a terrorist is near by.

Trade relationships need to be isolated from militaristic affairs, otherwise you have nations using force to create more favorable trade deals for themselves and their allies. China is our largest trade partner, I have yet to see U.S. troops help them suppress their people, or invade Tibet. In fact we actively defend Taiwan in direct opposition to China's desires. Your logic is flawed that militaristic aggression is advantageous in the development and continuation of healthy trade relationships.

Isolationism is completely different that non-interventionism. Isolationism includes economic protectionism where the isolationist nation engages in unfair protectionist trade activities, or refuses to interact with other nations.

If the powers that be really cared about terrorism, they would have closed the borders long ago. The U.S. gets more illegal aliens every day. If they can get through, a professional terrorist can as well. But, apparently, no one really cares.

FordGT90Concept, Paul is more of a fiscal and "for smaller government" conservative than most "conservative" Republicans are. However, yes, he's more of a Libertarian than he is a Republican. People who agree with Ron Paul should look to the Libertarian Party more than the Republican Party, especially now that the Republican Party seems to be mostly neo-conservative.

Anywho, question for the masses: If wars are good for the bottom line, and WWII ended The Great Depression, shouldn't the U.S. have a really great economy right now?

Name one conflict since WWII where it was advantageous for us to fight another nation, or when we went to aid of an embattled ally?

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Gulf War. Iraq invaded Kuwait, Saudi Arabia felt threatened, Saudi Arabia asked for NATO to assist (which pissed of Osama bin Laden and his rogue army), and we came in to push Hussein out of Kuwait. A lot of US oil comes from Saudi Arabia and a lot of Saudi Arabia's wealth comes from USA. We provide the men and machinery to conduct the war and they provide an airfield to launch attacks from/resupply aircraft.

You could say Afghanistan was justified, but now it has become a launching pad to put pressure on Pakistan while we kill innocent civilians in their border regions on hunches that a terrorist is near by.

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Terrorists don't wear uniforms. Life would be so easy if they did. Regardless, Pakistan has a lot of political turmoil right now. They don't have the means to attack in the mountain ranges and at the same time, they aren't allowing us to go in to deal with the threat. And no, there aren't many "innocent civilians" in that border region because that's where most of the attacks launched at troops in Afghanistan originate. If they are, the serve as no more than a human shield to the terrorists knowing that Western civilizations try not to attack innocents. What do you do about those situations? According to USA doctrine, we do not negotiate with terrorists. That most likely means innocents will be killed in the crossfire but who is in the wrong? The people using innocents as human shields or the people seeking to end the war by demoralizing the enemy?

Personally, I think we are asking the wrong auestions of Pakistan. Instead of insisting they help (they clearly don't want to) or requesting authorization to cross the border (they don't want that either), we should be asking them what would it take to allow us to send teams across the border? I would suggest embedding Pakistani officials/troops that have intimate knowledge of the reigion in with the USA/friendly forces. That way, we get what we need (terrorists) and we won't do something the Pakistani government (killing innocents) wouldn't like. In any case, we need to reach a compromise with them otherwise the situation in Afghanistan will continue to deteriorate.

Trade relationships need to be isolated from militaristic affairs, otherwise you have nations using force to create more favorable trade deals for themselves and their allies. China is our largest trade partner, I have yet to see U.S. troops help them suppress their people, or invade Tibet. In fact we actively defend Taiwan in direct opposition to China's desires. Your logic is flawed that militaristic aggression is advantageous in the development and continuation of healthy trade relationships.

China is still very defensive of other nations and have been throughout history. Even if we offered to help, they would turn aid away. They are a proud people and would rather their country perish than appear weak (e.g. Japan, WWII).

Compare Taiwan to China. Taiwan is tiny; China is huge. Taiwan has been considered its own country several times throughout history yet, the Republic of China claims it is theirs. We sided with the little guy because they were trying to become democratic rather than communistic. We don't have a problem with China so long as they don't try to "spread" (by means of war) Communism. If Taiwan were to decide they want to be Communist then that is their choice.

Isolationism is completely different that non-interventionism. Isolationism includes economic protectionism where the isolationist nation engages in unfair protectionist trade activities, or refuses to interact with other nations.

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That is a dated definition (circa 1900). The two have been intertwined since the first World War. True isolationism (1900 definition) is now impossible (except on the scale of tribes in remote forests). Why? Because they (other nations) will "interact" with you. I'm sure Somalia would love to be isolationist but too bad for them, the UN keeps sending them food. We pity the foos. XD

You could say Afghanistan was justified, but now it has become a launching pad to put pressure on Pakistan while we kill innocent civilians in their border regions on hunches that a terrorist is near by

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The locals willfully serve as human-shields, for the extremists, sympathise with them and offer asylum, all in the name of aiding a holy war. The innocence of the civilians are blurred, leaving Americans no choice. Although US pays Pakistan for logistical support (which is what makes for a big chunk of their economy), corruption in its own Armed forces is so high, that it is willing to use that money to its own interests (ousting democracy, allying with harboring extremist groups, using fear and terror to pretty-much run the country, while using the so called "democratic" government consisting of a president and a prime minister who are confused with what roles to play, as their "PR men" to the world).

The Pakistani armed forces is so saturated with religious extremism , that it is fighting an unwilling battle on the western-front against Taliban, so much so, that it is willing to give up all positions on its western border to move to east and fight India. It's safer and helps fulfill their religious fagoting. So they decided to incite conflict by carrying out state-funded terrorist attacks against India, the most significant of which was the one in Mumbai. It was after the Obama administration set fresh clauses to their aid-packages, saying aid would be provided only on their merit to help US in the west, they started undoing the repercussions of the Mumbai attacks.

After the Kargil war, when they were first pushed to the western-front, after the US started an offensive against Afghanistan, when the Afghan extremists started pouring into Pakistan, the first thing they did was to harbour them in the FATA region on their side, and deflect American attention to the conflict with India. It was only after US worked out proper financial aid packages to Pakistan, that it went back to "helping" the US on its west. We know from experience, Pakistan is a confused state, with many heads of the state. The US knows who to deal with and is getting its work done. "Innocents" getting killed is not an issue to sympatise with. On the one hand their own so called "homeland security" has miserably failed in sealing its western border to prevent infiltrations, on the other, they are unwilling to let US-collation troops in and do the job for them. Isn't their duality obvious? If innocents are getting killed, they have themselves to blame, not your war.

If the powers that be really cared about terrorism, they would have closed the borders long ago. The U.S. gets more illegal aliens every day. If they can get through, a professional terrorist can as well. But, apparently, no one really cares.

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The illegal immigration issue is rapidly subsiding because of the economic woes in the USA. The subject as a whole has fallen off the scope because of the economy. Yes, I think something needs to be done about but it is not a priority right now.

FordGT90Concept, Paul is more of a fiscal and "for smaller government" conservative than most "conservative" Republicans are. However, yes, he's more of a Libertarian than he is a Republican. People who agree with Ron Paul should look to the Libertarian Party more than the Republican Party, especially now that the Republican Party seems to be mostly neo-conservative.

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This, I know. The Libertarian party is not realistic in my eyes while the Democratic party is self-destructive (government nurse you when you're hungry mentality)/socialist. I like what the Republican party stands for (smaller government, focus on defense) but I don't like how they say one thing and do something else (bigger government).

Anywho, question for the masses: If wars are good for the bottom line, and WWII ended The Great Depression, shouldn't the U.S. have a really great economy right now?

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No, because the wars we have fought over the last half-decade are involving no more than 3 or 4 parties. They have limited impact on trade. As an example of this, the Oil for Food program was intended to help USA pay for the war in Iraq by trading with Iraq. It basically failed because the profits from the trade were little to nothing. This is mostly because Europe (like France) buys the Iraqi oil and we had to compete with the Europeans for the oil in addition to vast distances it has to ship. The plan failed; however, in situations like WWII where Great Britain was cut off from Europe supplies and because of the war effort, was desperate for goods, USA was in a position to profit.

As I said in an earlier post: war can be very profitable to those that position themselves well. In wars involving many countries involving vast amounts of goods being traded, there is more opportunities to profit. USA was not in a position to profit from Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Gulf War, and the second Gulf War--at least not immediately. This, being a tech forum, it should be abundantly clear how much consumer goods in the modern world comes from Japan and South Korea. We conduct a lot of business with both countries. We should expect the same from the democratic Iraq in the next 50 years.

@btarunr's comments: Need I mention Pakistan is known to have nuclear weapons. The situation involving Pakistan is fragile, at best, unfortunately.

Let me guess, they're keeping him in Pakistan so no other country tries to detain him? In other words, they are harboring a nuclear terrorist? That is, someone who doesn't have enough morale fiber to realize he could end up with the blood of hundreds of thousands on his hands. That almost makes me want to get more forceful with Pakistan, almost.